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Comments Off on Yields from Fields: How much sake from a parcel of land?

Have you ever looked over a golden brocade of ready-for-harvest rice andand wonder how many bottles of sake could be made from it? Maybe not. Regardless, it is not an easy question to answer, because there are so many variables involved.

The first of these variables is the typical yields a given strain of rice will provide versus another. Some varieties might yield only 450 kilograms of rice per hundred-square meters, whereas another might yields as much as 600 kg or more. That alone is a 33 percent difference.

Next consider milling. If a sake is made with rice milled down to only 88 percent, i.e. discarding but 22 percent of the rice, it has a big-ass head start on yields over a sake made with rice milled down to 35 percent, wherein 65 percent of the raw material is cast aside.

Then there are the steps of the brewing process. For example, how far is fermentation allowed to proceed? Fermenting until every last starch molecule has been converted to sugar, and that subsequently to alcohol, will lead to much more sake for a given amount of rice than stopping fermentation earlier. Furthermore, we need to ask how hard was the fermenting mash compressed to squeeze out the resulting sake after fermentation.

Fermenting further and pressing it harder will lead to more sake! But fermenting to the bitter end and then squeezing out every last drop of yield takes a huge toll on quality. Also, whether or not alcohol is added – and if added, how much – has a huge affect well. Yields for cheap sake in which copious amounts of alcohol are added can be double what they are for premium sake.

With all this compounding error, it is very difficult to say how much sake can be brewed from, say, a ton of rice. Still, it’s an interesting question. So let’s see . . .

To do this, we have to set up a few boundary conditions. Let’s say the size of the batch is one metric ton of rice, and that we are brewing junmaishu, so no alcohol has been added. Let’s also say that the seimai-buai is 60 percent, so that the outer 40 percent of the rice has been ground away.

Finally, let’s assume (huge jump in the analytic process here) that the moromi (the fermenting mash, one ton of rice) was allowed to ferment to the extent that, when the sake was separated from the leftover rice solids, there were 2200 bottles of sake. (A number supplied by a brewer as typical.)

Now, on to the land. Rice is sold by farmers in 60-kg units called hyo. A basic unit of farming land is 10 meters by 100 meters, and is known as a tan.

Since every rice strain is different, and since things vary from place to place due to weather conditions, we are starting to compound errors again. But for much good sake rice, like Yamada Nishiki, one tan yields eight hyo of rice. (Got that?) In other words, you can get about 480 kg of Yamada Nishiki from a plot of land ten meters by one hundred meters.

But wait! Keep in mind that this is brown rice, and we are using rice milled to 60 percent. So, to get one ton of our polished rice, we need to start with 1.66 tons of brown rice.

Firing up the calculator again, we see that we need about 3.5 tan to yield the 1.66 tons of brown rice. So, in the end, an area of 35 x 100 meters (about the size of a football field) will yield about 2,200 wine-bottle-size bottles of sake. But note that this is genshu, i.e. undiluted. So adding a bit of water to lower the alcohol content from 18 or 19 down to 15 or 16 will bring it to about 2500 bottles of sake, 720 ml each, from our one ton of polished rice that came from a field the size of a football field. About.

Please allow me to reiterate that the assumed degrees of accuracy throughout these calculations is appalling from an engineering standpoint. But still, it’s kind of neat to be able to glance out over a golden field of rice, and think, “Now let’s see . . .”

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For those that are interested, rice fields in Japan are measured in traditional units of area with unique names. And they are very close to metric measurements. Interestingly, this ties in to room measurement sizes, which in turn ties into tatami mat sizes.

Two tatami mats together measure 3.3058 square meters.

This unit is one tsubo. Three hundred tsubo is (300 x 3.3058) about 1000 square meters, which is also equal to one tan (10m x 100m). Ten tan, or a 100 x 100-meter plot, make up one cho. One cho is very close to one hectare. LIke, within one percent. Now you know.

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The next Sake Professional Course will take place in San Francisco on December 8 to 10. Learn more here.

Meanwhile, the next Sake Professional Course in Japan will take place January 26 to 30, 2015. Learn more here.

Amidst the veritable cornucopia of sake available today, a handful of them are labeled “unfiltered.” A small handful, admittedly, but the number of sake with this term on the bottle seems to be growing.

Amongst sake labeled as “unfiltered” in English, some are white and cloudy. This is easy to figure out; it is cloudy because they did not filter it. But other times we see unfiltered and it is totally clear. What gives?

The key to understanding this is to realize that there are two “filtrations,” but they are called different things in Japanese, but the best English translation for both is filtration.

Let us look at the cloudy stuff first. It seems obvious that it has not been filtered. Cloudy sake like this is nigori-zake, as many readers are aware. Nigori means cloudy, and nigori sake is sake that has in fact been filtered, but coarsely so.

When sake is made, the rice dissolves in the same tank in which the yeast converts the sugars (that are slowly trickled into the mash as the starch in the rice is converted) into alcohol and carbon dioxide. So when the 20 to 35 day fermentation is finished, the result is still full of undissolved rice solids. This is filtered out to yield clear sake.

When this filtration is done with a coarser mesh, i.e. one with bigger holes than normal, some (but not all!) of the rice solids are let through. This is nigori-zake. Note the term nigori can apply to any grade (although it is not commonly seen for higher grades), and while nigori is enjoyable, it is not nearly as refined as regular sake.

So, even though it is often called unfiltered, it is in fact coarsely filtered. (To be legally called sake, the fermenting mash must pass through a mesh of some sort.)

However, the word in Japanese for this step, shibori or jousou, does not mean filter, but rather means to squeeze or press, as that is what actually happens: the fermenting mash is pressed or squeezed through a mesh. Yes, the rice sediment is filtered out at this stage. But that is not how it is referred to in Japanese. And since there is another filtration later, often this step is called “ pressing” in English.

So one meaning of unfiltered is nigori, or coarsely pressed sake.

Sake’s original color

Charcoal powder purifier

Next, after the sake is filtered…er, pressed, it sits for a bit to settle down, and at some point soon thereafter the brewer will dump a small amount of active charcoal powder into the just-made sake. This settles down to the bottom, pulling with it rougher flavors and elements that give sake its original and naturally beautiful lime-green-amber color. The sake is then passed through a series of paper filters to remove the remainder of the charcoal and the roughness it takes with it. This, obviously, is the second filtration, a charcoal filtration, and this step is called roka, which is the equivalent of the word filtration in English.

But some sake is made without this step, in other words, some sake is not charcoal filtered. There are those that feel their sake is clean enough to not need it. Others prefer the original goldenrod hue of sake and choose to retain it. Some sake is made so as to retain that mineral touch that can be present if charcoal filtering is eschewed. And some like to make sake (or market it) as close to its natural state as possible.

Reasons aside, if a brewer chooses to let everyone know the sake is unfiltered, the term muroka is used, indicating that the charcoal filtration step was skipped. This can mean a slightly more rambunctious flavor, but that is not a given! The difference may be in fact quite subtle, or even totally unnoticeable to most people.

Note, neither type is unequivocally better than the other. Charcoal filtering in the right measure is a good thing, but muroka has its appeal as well. And the differences are not that clear-cut in any event. That’s for sure.

Also, remember there is a lot of vagueness here. Sake can be filtered by solid state ceramic filters too, using no charcoal. But the term muroka is not legally defined, so some use it to mean no charcoal filtration even though a mechanical filter may have been used. Or not. It’s vague. It’s sake. We have to deal with that.

But to sum up and simplify, if the word “unfiltered” is on the label and it is white, it’s nigori. If the word “unfiltered” is on the label and it is clear, it is muroka. Chalk it up to linguistic idiosyncrasies, and enjoy your unfiltered sake.

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Be sure to look for my new book, Sake Confidential, available now at Barnes and Noble, Amazon, and the other usual suspects. Please check out the customer reviews on Amazon:

In over two-dozen short essays presented in a very informal and conversational tone, “the truth about sake” is revealed. The truth about junmai types versus non-junmai types, the truth about the impossibly detailed craft of sake brewing, the truth about temperature, premium types, aging, purity, pasteurization and regionality are all touched upon.

How the industry works, its challenges and strengths, what really creates sake flavors and aromas, specs you can safely ignore, and what hype you can safely avoid are all fair game. You’ll learn what goes into sake pricing, and how brewers get their rice. How to choose sake, and how to improve your tasting ability are also part of the fun. Suffice it to say that nowhere else is so much detailed information about the realities of the sake world assembled together into one place.

I usually write about the “nationals” in June, right after the competition takes place in May of each year. But some recently gleaned stats have compelled me to address it again this month. The contest is called the Zenkoku Shinshu Kampyoukai, which is translated as the “National New Sake Appraisal” but for some curious reason it is officially known in English as the “Japan Sake Awards.”

As many readers know, it is a blind tasting of sake that is specially brewed for this contest, basically daiginjo on steroids, i.e. intense in aromas and flavors, but exquisitely if precariously balanced. It can be amazing stuff, as is the skill to brew it the way it is, but its intensity is, well, intense. One small glass is plenty for most folks.

But that is not the point! The contest was created to give the brewers a chance to polish their skills and develop techniques that would make all of their sake better. Ostensibly, that is. And in any event the yearly competition has taken on a significance of its own. It is far and away the most prestigious event in the sake industry, yet the average consumer has no clue it exists or what its significance might be. And I am at a loss to explain that.

There is an excellent sake promotion company called Fullnet in Tokyo, run by the inimitable Shigero Nakano. The small company runs big events that include massive junmai-shu only tastings and more. They also publish a handful of books with really good information that one cannot get elsewhere. For example, they publish a book that lists the company name, brand, address and contact information of every brewery in the country. And they include interesting tidbits like the 50-plus junmai only kura, or the kura brewing via women toji, or lists of the kura that ceased operations each year. And they also publish a yearly report in book form on the Japan Sake Awards. The below informaton has been culled from this year’s publication by Fullnet.

The contest started in 1911 and has run every year but two; as such, this year was the 102nd running. According to the introduction, the first 44 times they ran the contest, the results were not officially made public, nor were the records kept. That’s it. Kaput. The first 44 may as well not have taken place. In a country with such a sense and awareness of history, this astounds me.

In 1956, they started to keep records, and kept them for each year since then save (inexplicably) two. But of the 54 or so, about 20 have gone missing from official archives. Nothing sinister, just no one thought they were worth keeping (which is sinister enough). But records exist with the companies that participated, and results have been dug up and gleaned from those.

The fact that so few official records remain from such a historically and culturally significant series of events is mind-boggling to me. Still, having hung out with sake for 26 years now, it is not surprising to me.

There are many interesting statistics that exist – like longest runs of gold medals, or the most golds overall, or the most over the last ten years. About one fourth of the entries win a gold each in recent years, but nevertheless it is a significant accomplishment and hard to do with great regularity. As such, studying such data can help lead to a good idea of which companies have a significant industry presence.

As prestigious as the contest is, and as much as it has benefited the industry, it has had its dubious effects as well. The judges that assess such sake are with the central government and get transferred a lot. But the criteria they use to assess a sake are the same. So as they go from region to region, they end up influencing sake styles. And as such, traditional regional styles may have in some regions taken a back seat to winning medals and making ginjo-shu that would sell in the big cities.

For example, a sake that is rich and earthy and perhaps even a bit on the amber side might go well with the food, climate and culture of a particular region. But it would never win a gold medal, and would not likely sell in Tokyo. Often the judges would “ding” sake like that, influencing the style of that producer. These trends tend to gather critical mass, and the styles drip-down to lower grades of ginjo, and slowly regional styles fade into oblivion, replaced by more homogenous albeit tasty and refined profiles.

Everything in the Universe has a price. And that includes competitions that improve the image and quality of all sake as well.

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Be sure to look for my new book, Sake Confidential, available now at Barnes and Noble, Amazon, and the other usual suspects. Please check out the customer reviews on Amazon:

In over two-dozen short essays presented in a very informal and conversational tone, “the truth about sake” is revealed. The truth about junmai types versus non-junmai types, the truth about the impossibly detailed craft of sake brewing, the truth about temperature, premium types, aging, purity, pasteurization and regionality are all touched upon.

How the industry works, its challenges and strengths, what really creates sake flavors and aromas, specs you can safely ignore, and what hype you can safely avoid are all fair game. You’ll learn what goes into sake pricing, and how brewers get their rice. How to choose sake, and how to improve your tasting ability are also part of the fun. Suffice it to say that nowhere else is so much detailed information about the realities of the sake world assembled together into one place.

Sake yeast choices are an interesting – if frustrating – topic of study. I have covered them many times in the past in this newsletter, should you be interested in perusing the archives and even older back issues.

In short, yeast converts sugar to alcohol, and the choice of yeast leads to varying aromas – among other things, most notably acidity. There are many other things behind the choice of yeast, including robustness of fermentation, tolerance to alcohol, preferred temperature range and more.

Studying yeast types is interesting since they do have tendencies that we can learn to pick out. It is frustrating because there are many types, with countless variations and mutations, and they are blended all the time too. It all gets hard to follow! But if we can maintain our sense of humor, it continues to be worth it and fun.

These days there are many sources for yeast, but the classic source for the classic yeasts is the Nihon Jouzou Kyoukai, or the Brewing Society of Japan, a research organization that makes great yeast in pure form available to brewers.

Back about 80 years ago when this organization was put together, they started to reproduce yeast that was known to be strong and predictable, and make it available to any brewer in the industry in little ampules. This helped ensure good sake, which led to good tax revenue. 😉

They started, naturally enough, with what they called Yeast Number 1. Next came Yeast Number 2, and so on. These days, they are up to Number 19, although there are a handful that do not follow this simple numbering convention. The yeasts distributed by this organization are collectively referred to as “Kyoukai Kobo,” or “Association Yeasts.”

But the first five fell out of comparative disuse, as did many of the more recently developed strains. In fact, there seems to have been shake-out amongst these yeasts, to the point that the only ones we see on a large scale are #6, #7, #9, #14, and #18-01. (Number 19-01 is only recently developed and has not had a chance to make its presence felt in the industry.) The others have all but disappeared. Not totally, mind you, but they are much less commonly seen.

Number 6 was developed at Aramasa in Akita, a brewery that is now making the most of that yeast and is massively popular, and deservedly so. Number 7 was developed at Masumi in Nagano, where it is also used with great success. However, ole’ 7 was erstwhile the most commonly used yeast for regular sake in the country. It still may be!

Number 9 was developed at Koro in Kumamoto, and while more ginjo-esque than its predecessors, it now may be giving Number 7 a run for the money in how commonly it is used.

Number 14 is more recently developed, in the last twenty years, and while popular in some regions – in particular those in the center of the country, close to Kanazawa in Ishikawa were it was developed – is not all that widely used. And newcomer (comparatively) Number 18-01 is growing in popularity for daiginjo sake, much as Number 9 did twenty or so years ago. (Note, the -01 just means it is a non-foaming version of the regular yeast. So Number 18-01 is really Number 18 that does not foam up so much. But this is a topic for another time!)

So, what’s the difference? What might you need to remember? In its simplest essence, bear this in mind: the higher the number, the fruiter the aromas, and the lower the acidity. So, Number 6 has a solid acidity and not much fruit. Number 1801 is much softer due to lower acidity, but much fruitier as well.

Is it really that simple? Of course not. Nothing is, especially in the sake world. But that general rule of thumb will serve you well, and you can stick it in your back pocket when you go out drinking sake.

Also, while not mentioned above, Yeast Number 10 is an interesting topic. It is basically a descendent of a family of yeast strains known as Meiri, developed by a company, Meiri Shurui, brewers of a sake called Fuku Shobun, in Ibaraki Prefecture. The straight Meiri yeasts are massively aromatic and popular, and as such, the ancestors, relatives and descendants (remember, yeast generations are very short!) of this yeast are much, much more common than the actual Number 10 itself. In fact, it is hard to define what a Number 10 tastes and smells like, in my experience anyway, since it so hard to come upon one that is pure anymore.

Of course, there is much tinkering going on. Many brewers had what was once a Number 9, as just one example, but now has mutated and changed to be something else. But they still might call it Number 9. Which is fine!

Also, there are countless other yeasts, developed by various research centers or naturally occurring in breweries. Tons of ‘em. Oodles and oodles of ‘em. And they are blended in myriad ways on top of all of that.

Hence aforementioned frustration, and aforementioned fun.

But when it comes to the Association Yeasts, the classics, which still arguably are used in most of the sake in the industry, we’re down to Numbers 6, 7, 9, 14 and 1801 as the main ones, i.e. “the usual suspects.” And remember the higher number, the more the fuit, and the lower the acidity. It’s a great rule of thumb that will only add to your enjoyment of sake.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Be sure to look for my new book, Sake Confidential, available now at Barnes and Noble, Amazon, and the other usual suspects. Please check out the customer reviews on Amazon:

In over two-dozen short essays presented in a very informal and conversational tone, “the truth about sake” is revealed. The truth about junmai types versus non-junmai types, the truth about the impossibly detailed craft of sake brewing, the truth about temperature, premium types, aging, purity, pasteurization and regionality are all touched upon.

How the industry works, its challenges and strengths, what really creates sake flavors and aromas, specs you can safely ignore, and what hype you can safely avoid are all fair game. You’ll learn what goes into sake pricing, and how brewers get their rice. How to choose sake, and how to improve your tasting ability are also part of the fun. Suffice it to say that nowhere else is so much detailed information about the realities of the sake world assembled together into one place.

There are, at present, perhaps 100 varieties of sake rice out there. A few new ones are born (crossbred) each year, and a few fall out of production, and therefore out of official existence. And of those 100, a disproportionately high number have the character for “nishiki” (pronounced closer to neeshki) in the name.

There is of course the most famous, Yamada Nishiki. But also there are Miyama Nishiki, Hattan Nishiki, Oyama Nishiki, Kinmon Nishiki, Saka Nishiki, Toyo Nishiki and even Hakutsuru Nishiki. Then there is Misato Nishiki, Kita Nishiki, Senbon Nishiki, Tosa Nishiki, Yume Nishiki, and yet a few more nishikis out there as well. You probably get the point by now. Interestingly, this character does not make an appearance in eating rice, just in sake rice. At least, as far as I can ascertain things.

So, just what is a nishiki anyway, and what is it doing in our sake rice?

The most commonly found translation in Japanese-to-English dictionaries
is “brocade.” Okay. Fine. But that doesn’t really help much either. I mean, what, really, is a brocade? A similarly typical dictionary check resulted in this: “A class of richly decorative shuttle-woven fabrics, often made in colored silks and with or without gold and silver threads.” Oh; okay. That helped.

To me, a brocade is a beautiful cloth or tapestry hung on the wall, usually with some meaning involved in it – like, it represents something or has a story behind it. Kind of like a tapestry but richer in appearance. I learned a lot more about brocades in researching this, but never found out why they might be in so many sake rice names. But then I met a farmer who is also sake brewer.

Yuichi Hashiba is his name, and his brewery is Izumibashi Shuzo of Kanagawa, brewing a sake called Izumibashi. And he explained it.

Rice is planted sometime between April and June, and harvested sometime between August and October. Most sake rice is planted later and harvested later than most eating rice. Most, that is. But when harvest time comes around, be that August, September or October, one can stand on the edge of expansive rice fields and look out on the golden ears of rice that hang over in their ripeness, awaiting the sickle. Or a combine, which is more often the case these days.

When I visited Hashiba-san last fall, we strolled out on narrow lanes separating fields of Omachi, Yamada Nishiki, and Kame-no-o.

“Look out at all that,” he began. “See that beautiful golden expanse of sake rice? Look at all those hanging ears! Duddn’it all just tell a story? Duddn’it look like something you could hang on a wall as a show of glory and success?” You could see by the passion in his eyes that he indeed meant it.

And as we gazed out upon these acres of golden ears of rice bending in anticipation, the wind blew, causing the whole scene to move in undulating, golden waves. It looked like… well, like a brocade of rice surging and swelling in gentle waves. It looked like a nishiki, actually.

All it took was one explanation with a rice farmer / sake brewer as we stood at the edge of his fields on an October evening as the wind gently blew. It was clear why so many sake rice types have the character for brocade in their names.

Being early July, it is still a couple-few months before we can see this again. But it is a beautiful scene, and one that will remind us when we see it that the next sake-brewing season is, again, just around the corner.

Last time, we looked at the idiosyncratic rice distribution system in Japan, and how that affects the 1.4% of all rice that sake rice represents, with the main points being that brewers themselves almost never own the fields, and that the majority of sake rice, by far, is distributed by powerful agricultural cooperatives, a system that has its attendant strengths and weaknesses.

As rice distribution in Japan is deeply rooted in all that Japan is, a comprehensive study would extend beyond the interest and attention span of even the most ardent readers and sake fans. So let us keep close to how it relates to sake in what follows here.

In truth, there is a lack of clarity related to all things rice-distribution in Japan, much of which affects the sake world. For example, while the rice for top grades of sake is fairly easy to order and trace, remember that most sake is not premium, and the rice that goes into that lion’s share of sake on the market – while cheaper than top-grade sake rice – is a driving element in the sake industry. In other word, most of the sake on the market is made of this somewhat lesser, significantly less expensive rice. So when the supply of that is threatened, the effect on the market is huge.

And that is what we have happening right now. There is a system of supplying rice within the current distribution system in which brewers can specify a minimum of information about the rice as a request, but what they get may be different. But it won’t matter, at the level at which they are using it. The system refers to such rice as “kakomai,” but let us call it the “cheap rice system” here, abbreviated CRS.

So, what is purchased through the CRS is somehow subsidized by local prefectural governments. And the rice itself can be a blend of stuff that was left over from higher than expected yields or lower than expected orders, or perhaps some of the less-carefully grown stuff. And all mixed together as well. But it is very inexpensive, comparatively speaking.

But in truth, as mentioned above, it won’t really matters as it will be used for cheaper sake, and it will do fine. Having said this, though, remember that cheaper sake is 65 percent of the market.

Who can grow what, and how much of it, is strictly controlled by the government so as to avoid having excess stock and thereby adversely affecting market stability. However, there are some gaps and loopholes and options open to the farmers. There is no obligation to grow rice that would be used in the CRS system. And over the past couple of years we have seen more farmers move away from rice that could be used for sake brewing and growing vastly inferior rice that can be used for animal feed.

Why? Because government subsidies for fertilizers and insecticides and the like are higher for fields allotted to the animal-feed rice. On top of that, fields on which such animal-feed rice are grown do count toward the allotment of land upon which a farmer is permitted to grow rice. So, they get more subsidies, and can grow as much as they want. No wonder they choose that over rice that could go through the CRS and be used for sake.

Why would animal-feed rice be favored? Because that limits the need to import it, helping to offset trade imbalances, as well as assisting local agricultural. Good reasons to be sure! But the effects on sake could be big. How big? Hm. Once source has said that only 30 percent of the orders can be filled with inexpensive CRS rice, and that the cost of said rice would increase by as much as 25 percent. That will undoubtedly affect the brewing industry in both profitability (to the degree that it actually exists!) and consumer prices too. Apparently the situation is fairly grave.

Note too that not absolutely everyone is affected. A few large and stable breweries have the economies of scale in buying power to negotiate cheap enough prices for high enough volumes where they do not need such rice. So they are immune. And some premium brewers do not mess with that rice either, using only contract-grown rice or top-grade sake rice. But most of the 1350 breweries remaining will be affected.

Also, the impending developments related to the multinational economic agreement known as the Trans-Pacific Partnership, or TPP, may drastically affect things as well by opening up Japan to very cheap rice imports – if, that is, Japan chooses to fully participate. When I asked one brewer about it, he insisted it was a very good thing, and that Japan’s rice system desparately needed to change, and that despite the short term pain in would be good for Japan in the long run. However, became so passionate (read: irate) that I could not longer understand his rant, fading off into a local accent as he did. So the details were lost on me but I got the gist.

Next, remember, brewers have to buy all that rice up front. Which means, every autumn, many have to significantly strain their finances just to start the season, the return on which they will not begin to see for a year at least. Securing and backing the requisite support in a fragile economy for a contracting industry is another big issue.

There are more vagaries that the rice growing cartel, er, communities employ, and often the sake brewers themselves do not fully understand. I remember one brewer from Shiga, near Kyoto, telling me that they were finally able to grow Yamada Nishiki in Shiga. “You mean, you could not grow it here before? But I know I have had Shiga sake made with Shiga-grown Yamada Nishiki,” I asked inquisitively.

“Well,” he stammered, “you can, but you cannot put it on the label – until now.”

“Oh?,” I continued. “Who controls that?” I asked out of sincere interest. Rice growing is controlled by one industry, sake labeling by another. I sensed a disconnect. And so did he.

He thought a second, and said, “Wow. I don’t know. That’s just what the farmers told me. Let me check on that and get back to you!”

Yet another brewer from Yamagata told me that he had been told that one could not put the name of the rice on the label unless the seeds came from an official source, i.e. the cooperative. Huh? Sez who? And enforced by who? Is this the law, I asked?

“It’s, uh, vague,” said my Yamagata brewer friend. “And the frustrating thing is that the folks distributing the rice keep it that way. Those that know keep it vague! I could explore it further, and challenge it, but I have other higher priorities. So we just deal with it,” he acquiesced.

Sake is unique in many ways. For better or for worse, the extremely high cost of the raw material is one of those ways. And the byzantine distribution system – while it serves some purpose indeed – is yet another. Let your understanding of this add to your appreciation of all that goes into the glass of sake before you!

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Dallas, Texas, August 8~10, 2013

The next Sake Professional Course will take place August 8-10, in conjunction with TEXSOM 2013 at the Four Seasons Resort and Club Dallas at Las Colinas in Irving, Texas

The Sake Professional Course, with Sake Education Council-recognized Certified Sake Professional certification testing, is by far the most intensive, immersing, comprehensive sake educational program in existence. The three-day seminar leaves “no sake stone unturned.”

The tuition for the course is $825. Feel free to contact me directly at sakeguy@gol.com with any questions about the course, or to make a reservation.